Old Moor

We're creating a wildlife garden at our Old Moor nature reserve in the Dearne Valley, South Yorkshire. Follow the garden's progress and see what comes to visit! We'll also be bringing you the latest news from the reserve. 

Friday, 14 November 2008

About Gardening

Our latest venture is all about demonstrating that the act of gardening can be inclusive, can improve quality of life, and increase UK biodiversity.All of these influence the way our garden will be interpreted - remember that it is a visitor attraction after all.

Our creative services team at the RSPB have been working hard to design some innovative pieces that will capture this sense of 'people power' in the garden, and across the environment more generally. Afterall, gardens cover almost a million hectares of the UK alone. 

By using interpretation in this way we are not just flatly informing visitors of what it is they are looking at but actively engaging them with what they enjoy. This way, we can attempt to motivate people to change their own behaviour; by gardening in a wildlife friendly way; by volunteering; or maybe by becoming members of the RSPB.

Posted by Julia Makin at 12:45 on 14 November 2008. 0 comments

Monday, 3 November 2008

A gentleman in black velvet...

Whilst I haven't much new to tell you about garden progress (other than digging, followed by more digging) the group and I are really enjoying the company of a plethora of wildlife.

Last week whilst digging the last lengths of the lavender border, one of my volunteers noticed what she thought was a slight movement of earth. I'm sure I don't need to go into the detail of the jokes that ensued ("you must really be enjoying that digging" etc. etc.) but we all thought she'd gone a bit bonkers.

A little while later, another volunteer noticed the same thing and called us all over to have a look. Again, we all felt that perhaps someone had slipped something into the coffee that morning as there was no sign at that moment of any movement.

Then all of a sudden, there it was, quite like a mini-earthquake and terrifyingly fast, bubbling up from underneath the freshly dug earth - A MOLE! So soft and beautiful and incredibly busy. We think we must have disturbed it's tunnel, but it was certainly well on the way to building itself another.

I'm sure that many people regard these creatures as a pest but for us it was just another example of the fascinating wildlife that can live in a garden.

 

Posted by Julia Makin at 13:42 on 3 November 2008. 2 comments

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